Bulgarian Tie To Pope Plot Sought

May 31, 1985|By United Press International.

ROME — A prosecutor questioning one of eight men on trial for conspiring to assassinate Pope John Paul II sought Thursday to link the plot to Bulgaria and to prove that plans for the shooting were being made as early as 1980.

Omar Bagci, a Turk who has admitted smuggling into Italy the gun Mehmet Ali Agca used to shoot the pontiff in 1981, testified for a third day in the bunkerlike courtroom.

He testified Wednesday that four Turkish associates in Switzerland were involved in a plan to transport the weapon across the border, but insisted he did not know it would be used to shoot John Paul. It was the first time any defendant other than Agca has confirmed the attack was part of a conspiracy.

In July, 1983, Agca--who was already serving a life sentence for the papal attack--shouted to reporters outside a Rome police station that there was a plot organized by Bulgarian agents whth the knowledge of the Soviet KGB secret service.

Prosecutor Antonio Marini, questioning Bagci on the witness stand Thursday, said customs stamps in Bagci`s passport showed he passed through Bulgaria on his way from Switzerland to Turkey at the end of August, 1980.

At that same time, Marini said, Agca was in Bulgaria meeting with Bekir Celenk, the Turkish businessman accused of being the mastermind of the papal plot. Marini said that it was then Agca obtained the false passport he used to enter Italy shortly before he shot the Pope on May 13, 1981.

Agca received the false passport from Abdullah Catli--one of his friends in Turkey`s right-wing Gray Wolves terror gang, Marini said.

But Bagci said his trip had no connection with Agca`s activities. He said he merely drove through Bulgaria with three friends on the way to vacation in Turkey.

The trial was adjourned until Monday.

Bagci said one of his traveling companions was Erdun Eyup, a Turk he named in earlier testimony as the man who introduced him to Agca in Switzerland in January, 1981.

Eyup was one of four Turks Bagci named Wednesday as being involved in the plan. None of the four--Eyup, Mahmut Inan, Uenal Erdal and Ozdemir Vahdettin

--is among the defendants in the current trial.

Five Turks, including Agca, and three Bulgarians are on trial on charges of conspiring to assassinate the pontiff.

The trial was the result of a second investigation into the papal shooting. A first inquiry led to Agca`s conviction.